Subject of cars revs up GM's chief

By David Kaplan, Houston Chronicle

March 9, 2013Updated: March 17, 2013 5:32am

Photo: Aaron M. Sprecher / Bloomberg

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GM Chairman and CEO Dan Akerson, speaking in Houston this month, hopes to bring down the price of the Chevy Volt by $10,000. He says the plug-in hybrid represents an “unbelievable breakthrough,” partly because of its battery storage capacity. less

GM Chairman and CEO Dan Akerson, speaking in Houston this month, hopes to bring down the price of the Chevy Volt by $10,000. He says the plug-in hybrid represents an “unbelievable breakthrough,” partly ... more

Photo: Aaron M. Sprecher / Bloomberg

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GM Chairman and CEO Dan Akerson gushes over the 2014 Chevrolet Corvette Stingray, here shown at the North American International Auto Show at the Cobo Center in Detroit.

GM Chairman and CEO Dan Akerson gushes over the 2014 Chevrolet Corvette Stingray, here shown at the North American International Auto Show at the Cobo Center in Detroit.

Photo: Fabrizio Costantini / New York Times

Subject of cars revs up GM's chief

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Dan Akerson, soft-spoken chairman and CEO of General Motors, talked about his company's return from the financial brink and its accomplishments and strategies.

But what really got him charged was cars.

“This ATS is killing it,” he said in reference to the new high-performance Cadillac. He loves his Chevy Volt. And the new Corvette? One of the best cars ever.

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Sitting down for a meeting with the Houston Chronicle editorial board earlier this month, Akerson, 64, recalled the scary time when he took over as CEO in 2010 and how he helped guide GM out of financial straits and got it rolling again. He also stressed his desire to position his company at the forefront of innovation.

He defended GM's decision to accept the controversial government bailout in 2009, saying it was necessary.

He voted for Mitt Romney, he said, but the Republican presidential candidate's suggestion that GM could have done without the loan by filing for a structured bankruptcy and getting all the financial help it needed from private investors was unrealistic.

If GM and Chrysler would have gone under, Akerson said, automobile parts suppliers would have followed, eliminating countless jobs.

Several times, Akerson steered the conversation back to particular GM products, gushing over some that have yet to arrive in showrooms, such as the 2014 Corvette C7.

The Chevy Volt, a plug-in hybrid that debuted in late 2010, has not been given sufficient credit, he said, but it represents an “unbelievable breakthrough,” partly because of its battery storage capacity.

He noted that in one recent consumer survey, 93 percent of Volt owners rated the car as “great.” About 30,000 Volts were sold last year, he said.

To sell more Volts, GM needs to lower the price by as much as $10,000. Once that happens, he said, “I think they will break out.”

The Volt currently sells for $39,645 and is $7,500 less with a federal tax credit. Akerson wants the Volt to stand on its own without the tax credit.

He raved about Cadillac ATS and the 2014 Corvette, both of which are high-performance cars that underwent weight loss to deliver better fuel economy.

Akerson said the ATS is his company's answer to the BMW 3-series line. He said some people jokingly have said that “ATS” stands for American Three Series.

The redesigned 2014 Corvette C7, which generated buzz at the Detroit auto show earlier this year, is expected in showrooms this fall.

The 2014 Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra pickups, both of which will come out later this year, will have engine features normally associated with high-end Mercedes vehicles, Akerson said, including turbo, variable valve timing, direct injection and cylinder deactivation.

Akerson, who has an engineering degree from the U.S. Naval Academy and a master's in economics from the London School of Economics, seemed comfortable discussing technology.

When he previously worked as an executive at MCI and Nextel, he recalled, the turnover time for developing a product might be one year, but with a new GM vehicle it can take four to five years. The automobile is “a very complex machine,” he said, that must meet strict safety, fuel-efficiency and other standards.

Soon after arriving at GM, he learned that while the company ranks at the top when it comes to the number of inventions it gets patented each year, it needed improvement in its ability to find applications for its innovations, he said. That has been one of his main goals, he added.

He also acknowledged that the government bailout had a negative impact on GM's image.

One of his main challenges when restructuring the company was to negotiate with unions to reduce the company's pension liabilities and labor costs, in part by replacing raises with a profit-sharing program.

After dealing with these financial issues, while striving to make well-designed and fuel-efficient vehicles that are reliable and durable, he said he thinks the company has made “great strides.”